fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #4699 ]

[ SECRET POST #4699 ]

⌈ Secret Post #4699 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[For All Mankind (2019)]

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[The Outer Worlds]

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[The Expanse]

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 36 secrets from Secret Submission Post #673.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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It's really weird, cause if he was a book character, I'd say it would take a long time and a lot of atoning for me to call him "redeemed" or anything close, but since he's a movie character I'm more lenient? Probably cause movies are so short and the primary focus is on action and not on deep character studies. Plus, Star Wars is a space fantasy that is wonky on maaaany issues (Vader is officially redeemed and gets to be a force ghost after doing the right thing just once, everyone acts like the Jedi are some legend of old when it's only been like 25 years etc etc)

Aka I mainly plan to (hopefully) enjoy the movie, look at some fanart afterwards and stay the heck out of the fandom no matter which way the whole redemption thing goes - I do assume he will be redeemed (whatever that will mean) and also expect him to survive essentially because he's Leia's son. If he was some random, I'd say he'll go the redemption in death route, but I simply assume that they want to give her the happiest ending they can.

It's an interesting debate in that the format of film Vs book means that you can't necessarily do redemption more thoroughly yet everyone accepted Vader's redemption. Was this idea just easier to accept because a villain being redeemed the long way round wasn't necessarily as firmly lodged in popular consciousness in the late 70s/early 80s? Or is it that we've seen the redemption thing so many times in the last 30-40 years that we expect a lot more from it in general?

I'm always ok with villains being redeemed if it's done well but I sometimes feel that right at this moment in time even with allowing for the shorter format, films are still screwing it up somehow. But I don't know if that's just the fact that I'm quite picky over my redemption arcs.

Ignoring the fandom reaction is a good plan though!

I can't explain it myself. I do wonder if it's because today we expect characters to be more gray? Star Wars (especially the old movies) are very black and white in a way. You do good things, you're good. You do bad things, you're bad. We have no sympathetic character on the evil side (only speaking of the movies itself there, not the books/comics that surround them). Vader did good in the end so he was good and got to go to "Force Heaven". Child!me accepted that readily, meanwhile adult me grudgingly accepts it in canon - I guess it also helps that he's considered redeemed outside of the universe, but not really inside? Cause in the books barely anyone knows about his sacrifice in the end and basically no one really cares. They still hate him. So I kinda wonder if that's how it goes (though I do think they'll put more effort into Kylo Ren in the movie) and then more books will come out, showing him really making amends, while most of the galaxy still (rightfully) hates him.

I think that's an element of it but also that Vader's redemption was more about Luke than Vader. But nowadays we would still probably expect the focus on Luke but also more attention paid to Vader having a fully fledged arc rather than a seemingly last minute thing. I know Luke does say in advance he thinks there's good still in there but it does all happen very quickly compared to what we'd expect now.

I do think they perhaps need to address Vader's sacrifice in movie canon but I won't hold my breath. I mean, does Kylo Ren even know that the man he admires died saving the uncle he hates? I feel like we haven't had a firm answer to that one yet.

I think there’s two things that made Vader’s redemption easy to accept back in the 80s. One, he didn’t get to live to enjoy it. And two, we didn’t know what a little shit he’d always been.

That's true. The prequels probably make it a little harder to swallow. I mean, I doubt many people will accept an apology for child murder.

“ everyone accepted Vader's redemption.”

Look up David Brin. He hates Vader redemption so, so much (e.g. http://web.archive.org/web/20000519222903/http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/feature/1999/06/15/brin_main/index.html)

Interesting! Thanks for the link. I actually personally haven't encountered that view so much as a long-held view, I just assumed it was a lot more recently that people started to be critical of that particular part of Return of the Jedi.

I think a lot of it is that Vader's redemption is very carefully built to and narratively earned - the way that we start off with Vader's villainy in the first movie, then we have these world-shattering twist revelations in the second movie that prepare us for the reality that All Is Not As It Seems, then we have Luke insisting for the whole third movie that There Is Good In Him and then we have substantial sacrifice from both Luke and Vader to carry out the redemption.

And the thing with the sequel trilogy is that the narrative can't work like that and hasn't been set up like that. Part of that is the impact of Star Wars itself - we're all familiar with the twists, we know them, we've completely internalized their impact, and you can't cross the same river twice really. And the other part is that, of course, it's not really what happened in TLJ - the biggest twist in TLJ was probably Kylo's decision to stay on the dark side, which was a very effective twist that I like a lot but it obviously doesn't support the construction of a redemption narrative the same way "I Am Your Father" does.

Of course it still remains to be seen what they do in terms of setting up the narrative in the third movie itself.

I mean, Luke insisting that there is still "good in him" is literally the only thing that hints at some redemption - and my memory is a bit hazy, but I can't even remember what he's basing that on. Cause Vader said he wanted to rule with him? Cause he didn't shoot him when he was falling down after he cut his hand off? We don't get to see anything that proves it till that very moment. No hint, no morality pet he's occasionally nice to. Heck, he never even gives a fuck about Leia at all.

Meanwhile Kylo does show signs of falling apart, spares his mother and his talks to Rey prove that he's not HARHARHAR evil (I think that's why Hux is still there and even he gets a sympathetic backstory in the books). Of course the twist in the end is that he chooses the Dark Side regardless (which I also liked) and even THEN his last shot in the movie is him kneeling on the floor, looking sad.
I think that set up is actually a lot better (also really helps that we get to see his face and that Adam Driver is a decent actor) and could go both ways.

I think that telling us that Vader is Luke's father and that the backstory developed in the first story was basically a lie is also groundwork for redemption, narratively speaking, even if it's not officially labeled as such. And Luke insisting that there's still good in him (based on his force senses, which corroborates his instinct) is given quite a lot of weight in ROTJ iirc.

Kylo does get a lot of emotional beats and complexity, you're totally right, it's just that his decision to stay on the Dark Side makes it complicated and non-obvious to read that emotional complexity as pointing towards redemption in any kind of simple straightforward way.

I'm not disagreeing with you, but I just think that Vader's redemption is foreshadowed more in... retrospect? (Especially since we know that the father thing wasn't actually planned from the beginning) As in, it DOES make sense (that it happened, not if the audience should just accept it), but without our hero Luke being insistent that he can Force-feel the good within him, most people wouldn't have batted an eyelash if the redemption hadn't happened (even with the whole father angle).

(Sigh. I just feel like the original trilogy just doesn't really give us a lot on Vader that we don't need to fanwank and then the prequels came along and made it even worse cause it gave us so much stuff that makes it hard to accept that these characters are the same person - ignoring all the additional fan stuff that not everyone has watched/read.)

I think that assessment is very fair. It also fits with my own view that Vader's arc in the end is more about Luke than Vader, though of course it does end with Vader's redemption but I always feel the greater emphasis is on Luke resisting that same path yet still needing his father at the end and that whole situation helping Luke understand his heritage, while also learning to forgive.

I've never been a fan of Kylo Ren just being Vader #2 because even for a fairly straightforward story like Star Wars it feels lazy. As you say, remains to be seen what they're going to do but if he is to be redeemed I hope it isn't just a rehash of Vader's end in Jedi. Mostly because it simply doesn't fit with what we've seen. I get that the comparisons to Vader are being laid on really thick but Kylo Ren has gone way more into the deep end than his grandfather ever did as (someone on F!S actually rightly pointed out to me) Kylo is essentially the Emperor figure by this point.

For me, the reason I was okay with Vader’s redemption was that he died very shortly afterwards. If he’d lived, I’d have needed a further three movies that started with his being tried for war crimes, maybe exiled, attempting to undo as much of the damage he and the Empire did as he possibly could, and being met with revulsion, suspicion, hatred, and fear by pretty much everyone, even if Luke advocated for him the whole time.

His dying instead works for me because if the story didn’t have time to show him doing that work, death at least allowed him to go out on a relative moral high note. I wouldn’t have bought any kind of triumphant, five minute montage, happy movie ending where he lived; for that amount of awful, death or a life of penance and atonement are the only choices that wouldn’t ruin his redemption.

To bring it around to Kylo, an ending where he lives, he’s forgiven and welcomed by Leia and Chewie, and where Rey locks lips with him over the end credits, or whatever, would feel fake and awful because one act doesn’t equal redemption for the kind of atrocities committed by Vader and Kylo.

If Kylo Ren redeems himself and lives through it, his life from then on would have to be at least 95% working to atone for his crimes, with the understanding that many, if not most of the people that his actions harmed (those who aren’t dead) will (be perfectly justified to) never forgive him.

Maybe if Kylo sets off alone into the galaxy determined to protect the weak and right wrongs vigilante knight-errant style when everyone thinks he died in an act of noble sacrifice or something, then I’d be okay with it.

I've resigned myself to some kind of redemption for Kylo, I just hope it doesn't end up with Rey and Kylo married and in true forever love.

That, and hoping Rey isn't a biological Skywalker child. Those are my 2 big asks.

same

I share both sentiments, but tbf Rey turning out to be Luke's secret kid would make it less likely they'd pair her off with Kylo.

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[ SECRET POST #4699 ]

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